4 Signs of Emotional Abuse

This video explores the subtle and damaging nature of emotional abuse, highlighting four key signs to help identify it in relationships. It emphasizes the importance of recognizing patterns of criticism, tone, nonverbal cues, and dismissive reactions to understand and address emotional abuse effectively.

Emotional abuse can be incredibly damaging, increasing a person's chances of developing depression and anxiety, sometimes for decades after the fact. Broadly speaking, emotional abuse involves one person controlling another by undermining their sense of self-worth and personal agency. But emotionally abusive behaviors can be subtle and difficult to spot, both from within and outside the abusive relationship. That's partly because emotional abuse often exploits or creates power imbalances between individuals, especially in relationships where safety, care, and trust are supposed to be guaranteed. Examples include the relationship between a caregiver and a child, healthcare provider and patient, teacher and student, or intimate partners. It's especially insidious because it often makes people doubt their perceptions of their own mistreatment. So let's walk through some of the most common signs of emotional abuse to make these behaviors and patterns easier to spot in real life. First, the content of someone's words. Criticism that's out of proportion to a situation, excessively harsh or personal, or makes sweeping generalizations or baseless negative predictions for the future, is a warning sign of emotional abuse. Statements like, "You always make such stupid decisions," "You never do anything right," and "Nobody else will ever love you," aren't constructive, they're never warranted, and someone's use of them is a red flag. Second, tone and nonverbal cues. Yelling, ignoring, and showing contempt through body language are all ways to degrade someone. Dismissive behaviors like eye rolling, glaring, or refusal to make eye contact, along with refusing to speak to someone or acknowledge their presence, sometimes called the silent treatment, can all feature in patterns of emotional abuse. These behaviors can painfully transform the meaning of spoken statements that might otherwise seem benign. Third, how someone reacts to being told they've said or done something hurtful can give important insight. Do they apologize sincerely and act differently in the future, or do they dismiss and minimize the pain they've caused? It's common for abusers to try to undermine their target's perceptions of events. This is sometimes referred to as gaslighting. Following up demeaning, humiliating, or threatening remarks with comments that dismiss the impact of those remarks, like, "I'm just trying to help you improve yourself," "You should be grateful," or "It's really you that's selfish and manipulative, you're hurting me," are examples of this behavior. Lastly, when someone directs any of these behaviors at you, take note of whether this is part of a pattern of behavior from them. A one-time incident of name-calling or a demeaning insult might not be emotional abuse, while repetition over time can have a much more serious impact.